30 People On The Scariest Thing They’ve Seen While Driving Down The Highway

1. Was driving to work on a Saturday morning down the interstate. I was in the middle lane and I glanced in my side mirror and noticed a car catching me quickly. I looked over as it passed me and in the back of this coupe was a lady banging on the window screaming for help. I sped up to them and she noticed me and started screaming again. I got behind them and followed them and could see him reaching back and hitting her. I called 911 and as I was he sped off. As I was talking to dispatch I caught up and he noticed me and realized I was following him. He moved over in front of me and came to a complete stop. At that point I didn’t know if he had a gun or what so I went around him and exited. Once he went pass the overpass I got back on and followed him but he eventually lost me as I couldn’t keep up. Fortunately I was on with 911 the entire time and they had cops ready to pull him over. Eventually they got him to pull over and when I passed them he was handcuffed on the ground and she was sitting there. Come to find out it was his ex and he abducted her and was taking her who knows where. I followed them for around 30 miles weaving in and out of traffic and going 100 mph at times to keep up. Definitely creepy thinking of what he was maybe preparing to do to her.

2. I’m a truck driver and I’ve seen some brutal accidents but the worst was watching a person commit suicide by jumping off the overpass in front of me.

3. The passenger in the car next to me shot at the driver in the car in front of me. Was the last thing I expected to see on the highway that day.

4. A thing that looked like a headless and limbless human torso being battered around by the traffic. This stretch of highway is by a notorious homeless camp. I once saw a bloody faced man on the side of the same highway and thought nothing of it.

5. I was driving a 2 lane road that runs through my little country town one winter morning at 5 a.m. to get to a radio show I was hosting. I’m doing like 60 mph and all of a sudden I look to my left and see a pale face literally next to me against the glass (drivers side window). Was seriously spooked and thought I’d seen a ghost. Looked in the rearview and nothing but darkness.

I get to the radio station and couldn’t stop thinking about what I’d seen. I decided to look up the local news and saw that a man had been hit by a truck at the same spot literally 2 or 3 minutes after I’d driven by. I quickly realized the face I saw was a man trying to kill himself by hurling himself across the road in front of my vehicle but didn’t quite make it. The next car driving the opposite direction got him. I called CHP and told them my story and asked them to tell the driver so he wouldn’t feel as guilty knowing this guy had intentionally killed himself. Dude’s truck was totaled and I have no idea if CHP ever relayed my story to the driver.

6. My boyfriend had a 20 year old car with a mismatched door, and he lived on the top of a long, winding mountain road. One day we were coming down the mountain when we saw the same car coming towards us. It was pouring rain so we weren’t able to make out any details of the driver or passenger, but it was the exact same car with the same mismatched door.

We turned around as soon as we could and raced back up the mountain to try to catch up with them, but we weren’t able to. This was 15 years ago, and we both think it was us coming back up the mountain in some sort of weird alternate universe / timeline. (Not sure what to call it.)

7. A dead person while on the way to my first prenatal visit. Some poor guy from Atlanta was dumped in my hometown on I-75. I don’t think the police ever found out exactly what happened to him or who did it, or even if he was murdered or if it was an accident of some sort. I followed the story pretty closely for a while but no break in the case was ever made.

8. Saw a dude jumping in front of vehicles on the highway a couple years ago. Cops were called but the dude fucked off before they got there, they didn’t look too hard for him (I think he was hiding in the ditch?)

Well fast-forward a few hours later. It’s night-time. My friend is driving his family in to town for dinner and this crazy fucker LEAPS out in front of him just as another car was coming in the opposite direction, dazzling my friend with the headlights so he didn’t see the guy slip out of the ditch.

Needless to say he hit him at 100 kmph, smeared him all over the highway and my friend is fucking suffering the worst PTSD to this day.

It’s unsettling to think I saw the dude attempting to kill himself earlier that very day and barely anything was done to make an effort to catch him and get him some help.

9. My wife and I were driving to work. It was a couple of days from Halloween. While we were driving a lady just stumbled out of the wooded grove. She was covered in blood. At first thought I thought it was just a costume, and told my wife to look. Instantly, my wife’s face turned white and said that’s not a costume. The lady collapsed and my wife pulls over. She jumps out of the car and runs probably 450 feet to the lady on the ground. Me, seeing every horror movie out there, starts to scan the area. Making sure the person who did something isn’t still out there. My wife starts screaming “Caleb, bring water now!!!” I was scared, lots of school shootings and LV shootings were in my mind so I slowly made my way. She screamed hurry the fuck up!!! So I started to jog, and by a truck in the woods was a body, just laying there. Soon others stoped and started helping and 15 mins later an ambulance arrived. Turns out she was shot 2 times in the chest once in the stomach. The guy by the truck was headshotted and died instantly. They were trying growing marijuana, and had their farm robbed. She was in the ICU for 3 weeks but made a recovery. They said if my wife didn’t keep the pressure on her chest she would of died. We still went to work that day…

10. Driving from San Antonio to Tucson in the late 90s. I’m on I-10 in deep west Texas and I pull off to take a leak and stretch my legs. I got a late start and it’s late afternoon. The wind is blowing fierce and I look around. There are no cars on the interstate in either direction to the horizon, and just gravel to be seen in all directions. Eerie. I get back in the truck, turn on the radio. Nothing. I hit scan. It sweeps around the dial in circles, not finding anything. Like the world ended and I’m the only one alive on the planet. No cars, people, radio, nothing but wind and rocks.

11. I was in high school. I was with two other friends driving out in the middle of nowhere, rural roads, like nothing but cornfields for miles at a time with a farmhouse every once in a while. It was late at night, perfect for teenage kids to be out doing shit they weren’t supposed to be doing (drinking and smoking weed). All of a sudden, bright lights a ways behind us, we are all thinking it’s a sheriff’s dept car, and that we are totally fucked. Within a couple of seconds the lights are right on us, so bright that the entire inside of the car is so saturated with light that we can all clearly see each other’s bewildered faces. And as quickly as the light is upon us, it is gone, pitch black as it was merely seconds before. No sounds, no lights in the distance, just darkness. To this day I have no idea what it was that happened, it was about 25 years ago and I can picture the moment so vividly in my head still. I still run into one of the guys I was with every once in a while when I visit my home town and we always reminisce about it, while our wives laugh at our “crazy stoner story.”

12. Farmington, NJ 1999 I was driving along a windy back road at night where the houses were set back far away from the road and saw a man standing by his mailbox, staring straight ahead. I thought, “that’s weird, it’s pitch black out here.” I go around a bend and there was a woman doing the same thing, just standing and staring straight ahead, by her mailbox. Then I notice that there were people at every mailbox on the road just standing there, staring straight ahead. It was creepy. They looked like sleepwalkers.

13. On an empty back road in upstate New York. My friend and I saw what appeared to be two men in straight jackets running alongside the road.

14. I was young when this happened and was with my parents and a sister on a trip to my uncle’s house. We were coming upon a toll booth at night and we saw all these emergency lights. I looked out the window as we were coming upon the scene (they hadn’t blocked it off yet, it must’ve just happened) and as we go by, there’s a shoe… with part of the leg and foot sticking out.

It was a motorcycle that crashed into a semi.

It was awful and to this day I will not look at accident scenes when I come upon one.

15. Drove through wildfires on I-75 in southern Florida, across alligator alley. Flames were right up to the edge of the highway, near zero visibility. That was pretty scary.

16. About a year ago I was driving back home after fall semester at college ended. As I was driving along this interstate highway in the rural South, jammin’ and having a good time, I saw a guy sitting upright on the side of the road.

Upon taking a closer look, he seemed completely blue and partially disfigured. He was also somewhat bloated. He must have just been sitting there on the side of the road for some time. A state trooper was pulling up as I passed. I can still see him now.

I remember thinking to myself about just how close death is to us at all times. We don’t even know it.

There’s a cross on that spot on the highway where I saw him, now. I think about him every time I drive down that road. I hope he’s at peace.

17. Driving from Colorado to Cali. Middle of the day in the middle of nowhere. Drove up on what looked like 20 dead birds in the middle of the road. Did my best to avoid as many as possible but it was crazy.

18. Heading to the closest town on a relatively swirvey highway and noticed some head lights coming from the woods and thought to myself how strange there isn’t a pull out there. Realized it was a wreck, pulled over and ran to the car which was flipped and squished. Started yelling trying to see if they were still alive which they were. Asking all the normal questions when I realized the voice sounded familiar. Ended up being my uncle.

19. I was still learning to drive and my dad decided as a reward to let me go driving through some of the farm country near my place.

Well up ahead, by the side of a pasture we see this… red… blob… thing and I slow down a bit because I’m like “what is that thing” and I’m curious. At this point my dad is also looking as we’re approaching because it’s large, red, and… kinda pinkish and white?

Well we finally get up to it and it’s a literally a skinned horse lying by the side of the road, decomposing.

20. My boyfriend and I were on the way to Myrtle Beach this past summer and we were only about 2 hours from our destination. My GPS had us get off the highway and take some country roads. I thought okay maybe this is what it is until we get there. We were very much in the middle of nowhere when I noticed that my GPS was circling us back to the highway. Not sure why it even sent us this way to begin with. We are driving along this country road and all of a sudden there is a small house with about 75 mannequin heads sitting in the lawn.

21. I saw a plane right after it crashed. It was probably 15-20 years ago, I was a preteen and we were in the family van on the highway driving to a neighboring city. It was a small plane, not more than a 4-6 seater. I don’t remember hearing a crash but I do remember staring out the window and seeing it nose down in a rut, smoking, in someone’s back yard. I asked my parents if they’d seen it and they said they hadn’t. A couple hours later we’re driving home and the area is filled with fire trucks, police, etc. We must have gone by just minutes after the crash, at most, because the scene was empty the first time.

22. Was driving north on the 405 towards LA from San Diego. It was night time, I was driving in the carpool lane, and for a brief moment confused why there appeared to be two bright lights in my lane. Swerved out of the way just in time to avoid a head on collision with a car going really, really fast. The whole experience lasted about 4 seconds. The rest of the drive home I was jacked on adrenaline, and left wondering what would have happened if I hadn’t been paying attention to the road in that brief moment.

I looked up news reports and found that the guy was apparently intoxicated, driving his white car BMW over 100mph in head on traffic. Sadly it ended in a fatal head on collision a few miles past where I saw him.

23. I went to India for a visit. My taxi driver was falling asleep at the wheel. Asked him if he wanted me to drive. He said yes.

About ten minutes down the highway there was a police officer stopping traffic. I thought I was about to get in trouble.

Nope. A dismembered body. Just a torso and head with tendons and hanging out.

24. My uncle kept having dreams about him driving. In his dream, he would drive around this cliff area when he would come to this sharp curve that was unguarded on the side that was so steep, that it basiclly ran to the bottom of the mountain. When he got to this corner, his tire would suddenly just explode. Same tire every dream. He would then have an out of body experience and watch his car drive off of the cliff and he would fly out of the car, and tumble down the hill, mangling himself the whole way down. He would then lay at the hill for five days without being found.

He kept having this dream for about a month. it officaly creeped him out to the point where he went to the auto repair shop to get it checked out.

It turns out that there was a flaw in the EXACT SAME TIRE that was blowing up in his dream that would have made the tire EXPLODE WITHOUT WARNING. They didn’t know how much longer it would have been, but they said that he was lucky that he came in when he did. The dreams stopped after that.

A couple months later, he went to go visit my Grandmama and Grandad when he was driving somewhere very familiar. Thats when he realised it was the EXACT SAME CLIFF IN HIS DREAM. He stopped the car and pulled over and had step out to take a breather. He had taken the route before, but the cliff had never stood out before to him. Although are family is VERY religious, but he never really believed in it. But he swears that something out there is protecting him.

When he was telling me and my sister this story, he was shaking, because it still scares him to this day. He truly believes that he would have died on that day.

25. Old creepy ass town in Missouri, was driving at like 2 AM and there were a bunch of people walking down the street in masks and holding various sharp objects. Looked like something from the purge. I sped up and took my happy ass home, ain’t nobody got time for that.

26. I remember once I was heading to town and to get some food with a couple of friends. We were about head down the mountain and the car in front of us just swerves. She somehow completely swerves into the other lane and facing back towards us for a second before going backwards down a steep embankment and flipping. She disappeared into darkness.

We were like oh shit and stopped. Where she went it was hard to tell how steep it was and expected the worst. Go down there and car is perfectly upside down. Didn’t even look damaged. You get closer and you could tell she was in her seat upside down and texting. People stop and we all try to help get her out. But she won’t come just yet. You can barely tell but she’s inside collecting all her beer bottles and yelling not to call emergency services. Someone get the door open to an overwhelming beer smell. Eventually they and the police come. She was ok and got arrested.

Another time I was driving home late at night in the rain and went through a state park. Nobody on road at this point except me and another car coming the other way. Out of my peripheral I see the car go off the road and do a Dukes of Hazzard maneuver into a tree.

Girl hit some trees head on. Car totaled. Looks deadly. Front is wrapped around a tree. One wheel is down the road. I stop. No movement or sound for a few seconds or minute. I’m screaming to see if she’s alive. Girl eventually moves and crying. I get to her be still. Her face is covered in blood. It looks bad. I flag someone to help. He calms and talks to her while I get the fastest emergency service to that area.

She ends up ok. Just some bruises and a nice cut on her head that made her look like Carrie when I saw her. She doesn’t remember me at all and has fond memories of the guy I flagged down to help. I know this because I ran into her later in a store. Haha.

27. One time I was maybe 13-14 years old coming home from a hockey tournament with my parents on the capital beltway in Washington, DC. In the opposite lane I saw a car swerve, flip, and go over a bridge into the water. I called 911 right after I saw it and the call taker said they had just received a call on it and were already dispatching.

I really wonder what happened to those people, it was a memory I somehow partially suppressed but I remember the car and what it looked like, and how frightening it was to see it go over the bridge.

28. One night as I was driving back home from work, it was about 1 in the morning. There was a semi in front of me. The day was clear but all of the sudden a fog rolled in, which was completely normal for the area, but something seemed off about it. As I’m passing through the fog, instead of water droplets, blood droplets were coming on to my car. I had no idea what happened. Then fur and guts started raining on to my car. Apparently the semi in front of me hit a deer and I got caught in the aftermath of it. I drove home with bits and pieces of deer all over my car.

29. A meteor falling out of the sky. It was like 10:30 at night. In my peripheral vision I thought maybe it was a single fire work because it was bright. I looked up and saw a bright green ball shooting across the sky. I was overcome with fear for a split second and the thought flashed through my head I hope I don’t die right now from a warhead or a huge meteor strike. It fell across the horizon for what seemed like forever before it appeared to burn up. Turns out it landed a STATE away. No one got hurt but it was definitely copper because it was glowing bright green. The three cars ahead of me had all pulled over just as I did which I didn’t notice until I pulled back onto the road. It was seeing these other people witness what I just had that solidified what had happened for me. It w as seen falling from the sky in the surrounding three states. This was in the Midwest. It landed in Minnesota.

30. The car two cars ahead not making his exit and hitting the concrete barrier head on, spinning into the car in front of us. Both were totaled, but it didn’t even touch us. Made me never want to drive distracted ever, knowing that a single moment could do so much damage.